With our merry band of pizza tour brethren missing an integral member since we wrapped up our Pizza Tournament last summer, we don’t often get to judge Stamford pizzerias through the same lens as before. I say this, of course, because for but a brief moment last week, the Pizza Tour rode again into Vigilante’s Deli, the new pizza in town, that fights crime on its own terms! (HT – JR of Streets of Stamford).

Establishment. While technically one of the newer pizzas in town, Vigilante’s has been around in deli form for five or so years, offering up hot and cold sandwiches and other typical deli fare along with Italian dinner specialties. As is the case with most delis, Vigilante’s isn’t particularly large, but it’s close quarters and small, personable staff make each visit feel comfortable and homey. Seating is pretty limited in the cooler months, but we found ourselves to be very comfortable outside on one of their huge picnic tables on a temperate, summer evening.

Since delving into the pizza scene, Vigilante’s has added calzones and Stromboli to their menu in addition to a broad selection of traditionally topped and specialty pies ranging from The Vigilante to the “Vig”etable (get it?).

Pizza. Our pizzas of choice were the aforementioned Vigilante (sausage, sautéed broccoli rabe, fried Italian hot peppers) and a traditional margarita (so, we didn’t judge this place through exactly the same lens as before with our strict “plain cheese + one topping” criteria…).

Here’s The Vigilante on a picnic table, our photographer failed to shoot the margarita pie, yet again…

As far as crusts go, Vigilante’s was pretty bready and puffy, appearing relatively colorless and packing a bit of a yeasty punch without much of the chewiness we were looking for. The crust didn’t hold up well to the load of toppings offered, lending to the pizzas’ floppy, undercooked texture. All around, the cheese was very good (The Vigilante’s shredded mozzarella, and the margarita’s fresh slices of it), holding up well for a fresh and stringy bite.

The sauce was another story entirely; it was difficult to differentiate the sauce’s taste from the overpowering flavors of the specialty pie, but the clean flavors present in the margarita pizza made it pretty clear that this sauce was downright bland. Perhaps diluted by the inherent moisture of the fresh mozzarella and sliced tomatoes, this otherwise light and fresh sauce came across as being grossly underseasoned.

As we touched on before, the toppings had a tendency to overpower the pizza as a whole. However, they were quite tasty. The salty, savory flavors of the sausage combined nicely with the natural, concentrated bitterness of the broccoli rabe and the slow, spicy burn of the fried peppers for a particularly unique flavor profile.

Bottom line. Vigilante’s comes through as a deli should, with a personable, knowledgeable staff, quality base ingredients, and great flavor combinations, but the execution of our pizzas just felt off.

Establishment: 16/30
Pizza: 15/30
Hits the Spot: 5.6/10 
Large cheese: $12.95 (18")

Nonna’s has been taunting us for months to the point that we even tried to hold off on the Stamford Pizza Tournament back in July until they opened, but to no avail. While they may have not made our summer deadline, Nonna’s is now open and serving pizza. And where there is pizza to be eaten, so too is the Stamford Pizza Tour.

Establishment. Nonna’s is a pretty by-the-book pizzeria, sporting a takeout counter, a display case full of specialty heat-to-order slices, and a pretty sizeable dining area for eat-in parties as well. The atmosphere is a bit hackneyed and confusing, melding the otherwise unfamiliar themes of classy Italian plates and artwork hanging from the walls and Hewey Lewis and the News blaring out of the speakers above them, but we were comfortable nonetheless.

Seating was ample and almost excessively private due to the cubicle-styled divider splitting the dining room in half. As a result, we felt just short of neglected, staring into our empty drink glasses as our waitress went sprinting by, stopping only to take our order (she dropped the bill in full stride). Nonna’s menu is very broad, featuring Italian specialties, pasta specials, dinner specials (countless iterations of chicken, eggplant, veal, and seafood dishes), soups, salads, sandwiches and wraps. Interestingly enough, conspicuously absent from the first menu we received was pizza, but rest assured, Nonna’s carries it in the form of traditional, gourmet, and Sicilian-style pies complemented by a charming offering of calzones and other dough-rolled, pizza-like delicacies.

Pizza. For all the knocks we had on this establishment, the pizza itself is pretty good. Our pies of choice, a plain pizza and a gourmet spicy chicken (sauceless, topped with chicken breast and sautéed hot cherry peppers) came out screaming hot (albeit not at the same time…which was weird) and were considerably larger than advertised.

The crust was dense, chewy, and flavorful with an excellent crispy bite and surprisingly faint brick oven char. We were pretty split on the sauce, as it had the clean natural sweetness and tang we’ve come to expect and was portioned almost perfectly, but it was starkly underseasoned and couldn’t exactly wow us with its bright subtleties. As advertised on the door, Nonna’s uses a healthy amount of Grande brand mozzarella cheese which, with its a creamy flavor and stringy snap, complemented this pie very well.

Nonna’s really sets itself apart with its dedication to freakishly overtopping its pizzas with excellent gourmet toppings to the point that it’s almost comical but still greatly appreciated. Every square inch of our spicy chicken pie was covered with chicken and red peppers, and was packed to the brim with amazing flavor for a slow, spicy burn in conjunction with the smooth, creamy cheese. All in all, a very good pie.

The bottom line. If you can get past the inherent strangeness of the service atmosphere as a whole, Nonna’s certainly delivers with a very big, very good pizza, and very flavorful gourmet topping options.

Establishment: 19/30
Pizza: 23/30
Hits the Spot: 7.8/10
Large Cheese: $12.95

Located in pistol-wavin’ New Haven, Connecticut, the self-proclaimed pizza capital of the world, Modern Apizza brandishes a big, old, coal-fired brick oven and a street-filling queue that rivals both the oven’s size and age. Often mentioned in the same breath as New Haven’s iconic Pepe’s and Sally’s, Modern Apizza claims to have served the best pizza and calzone in town since 1934 and conveniently so, we’ve got the chops to test that very claim.

Establishment. Modern Apizza has the familiar ambiance of a wood-paneled den circa 1973 with a line stretching into the street on a typical Friday night (apparently a prerequisite for New Haven pizzerias) and a severe lack of parking. Framed by wretched Red Sox memorabilia, this restaurant offers a quick glimpse of its oversized coal-fired oven at the front counter amongst a thorough spackling of superfluous chowderhead propaganda. Misguided loyalties aside, Modern is otherwise marginally comfortable (cozy like a cafe…), albeit being a bit outdated and tremendously cramped (…or cozy like a basement). The service somehow managed to be personable and quick as well as snippy and mind-numbingly stupid, unable to answer simple questions like, “how long is the wait?” or “what is your best pizza?” and inexplicably throwing down full glasses of water on adjacent tables, splashing our party in the process. Modern’s menu consists of a limited variety of Italian appetizers and entrees, as well as sandwiches and calzones in addition to traditional apizzas, apizza specialties including crabmeat, clam, tuna, and both Italian and Veggie “Bomb” variants, and the infuriating overuse of the locally accepted term “apizza.”

Pizza. This pizza (or apizza, rather) did not exactly blow us away. In fact, it was quite average in light of what New Haven has offered up thus far. Founded on an oven-blistered, chewy, and uncharacteristically floppy crust, this (a)pizza was incredibly cumbersome and sloppy to eat while being (almost perplexingly) perfectly thin. The sauce was very simple, lightly seasoned and carrying the slight sweetness and unmistakable tang of crushed tomatoes. Unfortunately, it was in severely short supply and was thoroughly masked by the salty notes and golden brown smokiness of the high quality cheese that topped it. Further muted was the sauce in the presence of our toppings of choice: average but salty sausage and boring, flavorless, bring-nothing-to-the-table, waste-of-a-topping mushrooms. The problem with this pie was balance: an overpoweringly bad texture, a virtually dry crust, and overportioned cheese that killed the clean subtleties of an otherwise good sauce combined to create an average (a)pizza and proof that a coal-fired oven located in New Haven, CT does not necessarily spit out good pies.

The bottom line. While New Haven-style by definition, Modern’s haphazard, off-kilter “apizza” does not exhibit the unique qualities of a true New Haven pie, let alone those of a good one.

Establishment: 16/30
Pizza: 17/30
Hits the Spot: 6.5/10
Large Cheese: $14.00

Just when it seemed like we were finished, we got a request for this little gem that slipped past us despite having been around Stamford for 17 years. Impossible to visit during normal Pizza Tour hours, we had to make a special Monday afternoon excursion down to Canal St. for this one.

Establishment. Catering to the office lunch crowd, Vinny's Dock House (not to be confused with Vinny's Backyard) is primarily a deli and is open accordingly ("Daily, In Season from 7:30 am," for what it's worth). Located dockside (no surprise there), Vinny's has a very unique ambiance, clean indoor and outdoor tables, and a view of the water that you can't get elsewhere (save for Paradise Bar & Grill). The service was what one would expect of a deli: quick, businesslike counter service that was less than personable, but personable enough. Vinny's menu includes breakfast options, salads, hot and cold deli sandwiches served on Arthur Avenue breads, hot special entrees (meatloaf, chicken, pork chops, fresh fish on Fridays), pastas, and thin crust personal pizza à la "The Colony."

Pizza. Modeled after "The Colony's" iconic bar pie, the pizza at Vinny's Dock House evolved from a traditional Italian-style pizza "in the pan" to its current, derivative product upon customer requests over Vinny's time in Stamford. The whole wheat crust (which was admittedly a secondary option as they'd run out of their primary white crust) was extremely thin, making up for a prominent lack of flavor with an overabundance of crunch and char. The cheese tasted average at best with its weak flavors and rather salty notes in addition to being very dry and congealing fast (not unlike Colony, after all). The sauce was a relative highlight of this pizza, tasting of fresh tomatoes with a light, clean, simple bitterness and little else. That said, this underseasoning did not impress everyone. Our topping of choice, homemade meatballs, made this pie much more palatable due to both their abundance and immense flavor. Nonetheless, this aspect was unable to pull Vinny's pizza from its role as nothing more than a mediocre bar pie imitation of one of the most overrated pizzas in Stamford.

The bottom line. While we're sure Vinny's Dock House is a fine deli, their pizza is a lackluster imitation of admittedly better pies in town, with flashes of meatball brilliance that left us wondering what this pizza would be like if it would just be itself (that's the moral of the story, kids).

Establishment: 17/30
Pizza: 16/30
Hits the Spot: 5.3/10
Large Cheese: $7.50 (12")

Located on East Main Street, Stamford Restaurant & Pizzeria is a little Italian restaurant hidden amongst a rug store, Just Cats, and Exit 9 Bagels. We were pleased to host two guest judges on this leg of the Tour, including our fellow local blogger JR of Streets of Stamford and Bryan, a Burrito Tour veteran.

Establishment. We were greeted at Stamford Pizzeria by a rather pungent aroma at the door of an otherwise presentable, intimately lit, and (mercifully) neutrally smelling dining area. Moderately sized, this restaurant was large enough for our party of five, as we were quite comfortably seated at a long table beneath a kitschy full relief map of Italy complete with little light-up landmarks. The service was excellent at first, but tailed off and became less attentive and much more frustrating over the course of our meal to the point where we were on the verge of begging for our bill. Cleanliness was also suspect, as the bathroom is located in the kitchen and kind of grossed us all out. Stamford Pizzeria's menu consists of the standard Italian favorites as well as both specialty and traditional pizzas.

Pizza. We've sounded off on the mediocre establishment, but despite all that, this pizza is very good. The crust was rather tasty and well proportioned with just the right amount of char. Accompanying it is an average sauce that was underseasoned and in short supply, but otherwise complementary to the overall pizza despite a lack of bold flavor. Stamford Pizzeria does not seem to skimp on good ingredients, as this pie was generously covered with high quality cheese for a fresh flavor and a stringy consistency that wasn't excessively greasy (but could, and did cause the cheese to slip off the pie with ease). Our topping of choice, Italian sausage, also came in the form of high quality, flavorful, meaty chunks. Stamford Pizzeria's thin crust pie cooled a bit too quickly for our liking, but was very good overall.

The bottom line. Stamford Pizzeria is a frustratingly average establishment with a decidedly above average pizza in spite of many gaudy shortcomings not at all related to the food.

Establishment: 18/30
Pizza: 23/30
Hits the Spot: 8/10
Large Cheese: $10.60

AWARDS WON:

2009 – Best of East Side

2009 – Tournament Finalist (7th place)

Atlantic Pizza was once a takeout-only pizzeria located in the heart of downtown Stamford. Fortunately, their brand new dining room was more than hospitable to our large party of five.

Establishment. The beautiful new dining area was spacious and accommodating, but if Michael's parking was nothing short of abysmal, Atlantic's parking was simply nonexistent. Otherwise, Atlantic Pizza is a fine establishment with good service, ample seating, and a phenomenal menu. However, the restaurant atmosphere seemed a bit manufactured and antiseptic, without the soul of a true small town pizzeria.

Pizza. We all agree that Atlantic Pizza House has a good product. Unfortunately, there was no clear consensus on what made it good. Crust, cheese, and sauce received good to excellent marks across the board while texture was almost unanimously derided. We'd venture to say that this may have something to do with the asinine practice of cutting a circular pizza pie into squares rather than conventional slices (like, you know, a pie), but the jury's still out. This haphazard cutting technique has a tendency to provoke considerable ingredient slip as well, so yeah...don't do that.

The bottom line. Atlantic Pizza is a Stamford mainstay, but meddling little details get in the way of what is an otherwise good product.

Establishment: 20/30
Pizza: 21/30
Hits the Spot: 5/10
Large Cheese: $10.75

None of our five (five!) participating reviewers had ever been to Michael's before The Tour, so we had no idea what to expect after pulling it from the hat. You'll find that we were pleasantly surprised with both the establishment and the pizza that Michael's had to offer.

Establishment. The restaurant was spacious enough to accommodate our relatively large party however, it was quite a difficult task to make our way into the restaurant as parking was nothing short of abysmal. All other aspects of this establishment were easily above average, from the warm table service to the atmosphere as a whole.

Pizza. Michael's product is very good. The crust was crispy and flavorful, the cheese was above average and the pie remained piping hot throughout the meal. The sauce was overly abundant and left something to be desired in the flavor department as well. Texture suffered accordingly and the toppings (sausage) were sub-par at best but overall, the basic elements of good pizza were executed very well.

The bottom line. Michael's was a pleasant surprise all around but the parking situation might not win over anyone without a moped.

Establishment: 22/30
Pizza: 22/30
Hits the Spot: 9/10
Large Cheese: $11.50